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Savannah craftsman Phillips remembered for individuality

Friends remember Chris Phillips as a hard-working and talented craftsman who always went his own way.

“He marched to his own little drumbeat,” said Savannah’s Frances Smith.

A brick, stone and marble mason who spent years in Savannah, the 63-year-old Dowagiac, Mich., native died March 20 at his brother’s home in Fairvern, according to an obituary published Thursday on leaderpub.com, a Michigan news outlet.

A graduate of Atlanta College of Art, Phillips’ work in Savannah includes restored masonry at the Owens-Thomas house and the restored smokestack at the Georgia State Railroad Museum, according to stories in the Savannah Morning News.

“That stack had been the thing that sort of spurred the focus on the roundhouse complex,” said Smith, whose husband, Scott, is president of the Coastal Heritage Society, which operates the railroad museum. “Chris was just a magic part of that — getting that stack done.”

The Smiths had known Phillips more than 30 years, and last saw him March 16, when he spent the night with them before heading back to the Atlanta area.

Phillips, whom Smith called a “sweet, rogue of a man,” had spent most of his time away from Savannah the last few years, but she said she and her husband have many memories to cherish.

“Maybe more than 20 years ago, we used to live out on Whitemarsh, and Chris would come around periodically, usually on a full moon, and we’d get chairs out and drink whiskey and smoke cigars as the moon came up,” she said. “That was a Chris thing to do.”

In the mid-2000s, Phillips became known locally for recreating Victorian-era “slave tiles” in his massive backyard kiln, according to previous stories.

Local sculptor Haywood Nichols often helped Phillips when the tiles were being fired in the kiln. The process could take several days, and Nichols praised Phillips’ dedication.

“I don’t know where he got the energy,” he said.

The two met in college, and Nichols said Phillips was a self-sufficient person who led an adventurous life, often traveling to Europe and taking on new ventures.

“He was a wild man, and I’ll miss him,” Nichols said. “When Chris was coming to town, you could always tell things weren’t going to be exactly like everything else. He was a fine craftsman.”